News

CSC graduate edits new book for kinship caregivers

March 5, 2015

Kim Phagan-Hansel

CHADRON – “The Kinship Parenting Toolbox,” a 356-page guide for those raising kin, edited by 1999 Chadron State College graduate Kim Phagan-Hansel, was released this week by EMK Press in Warren, New Jersey. Phagan-Hansel is the editor of “Adoption Today” and “Fostering Families Today” magazines and the editor of "The Foster Parenting Toolbox."

For many children, their grandparents and other kin will become their guardians, foster parents or even adoptive parents. Because these children have suffered the loss of their relationship with their mother and father, they often must work to overcome deep emotional feelings. At the same time, their kinship caregivers face financial, emotional and educational challenges in parenting these children.

“These families step up to the plate to care for their kin because they love them and don’t want to see them enter foster care or face other challenges,” Phagan-Hansel said. “However, there are some unique challenges that these families often face; something I have witnessed firsthand in my own extended family.”